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Political Institutions: from Yeltsin to Medvedev1

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Political Institutions: from Yeltsin to Medvedev1 Sergei Zhavoronkov, Konstantin Yanovskiy 1 Political institutions: from Yeltsin to Medvedev Political institutions: the legacy of Yeltsin The 1999 – 2000 electoral cycle, although it was formally conducted under the same rules as the preceding one of 1995 – 1996, considerably changed the political agenda. Firstly, the Communists represented by the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) led by Gennady Ziuganov and his allies lost control of the State Duma that they had acquired thanks to a number of fortunate coincidences in 19952. Secondly, the victory of Vladimir Putin in the first round of the Presidential election and a sharp decline in popular support for Ziugnov in that election (29% as against 40% in 1996) meant that the threat of a Communist candidate winning the Presidency was eliminated. Thirdly, there was a significant strengthening of the executive branch of government – Prime Minister Vladimir Putin became a leader who had the support of the majority of the population (as, before him, had Yevgeniy Primakov and Sergei Stepashin). This was in significant contrast to 1996, when Boris Yeltsin managed to achieve a very difficult victory at the presidential election, only to witness his approval rating collapsing once again to a critically low level. Moreover, at that time official announcements concerning the President’s grave illness3 had given rise to a constant feeling of instability. In May 1999, there was an attempt to impeach the 1 This article has been specially written for the present collection.. 2 In the 1999 elections, the Communists managed to obtain even more votes than they did in 1995 (24.2 % vs. 23.2 %), but received fifty party-list seats fewer. This came about because the narrow gap between the CPRF and the pro-presidential Unity bloc, coupled with the high percentage of votes received by the parties that entered State Duma, had minimized their gains from the redistribution of the ballots given to the parties and blocs that had failed to enter State Duma. By contrast, in 1995 the LDPR – which finished second to the CPRF, the winner in the general election – received twice fewer votes than the latter, while the parties that failed to enter State Duma collected nearly 50 percent of the vote, and so, as a result, the CPRF’s gains from ballot redistribution were substantial. This time, the Communists won fewer seats in single-member districts as well. 3 Rumors about Yeltsin’s poor health were already circulating during his first term in office. In the latter half of 1996, he underwent heart by-pass surgery. By the end of Yeltsin’s presidency, his health problems had become apparent: he was absent from public view for extended periods of time, he frequently did not take part in important government and political events, he became very short- winded, and – worst of all – began to lose the thread of what he was saying in his public speeches. President. It failed at the first of the three stages of this procedure4 – at the point where the State Duma had to decide whether to bring charges against Yeltsin. Even so, one of the charges against Yeltsin (responsibility for the Chechen War of 1994 – 1996) was approved by 296 votes, four votes short of the necessary 300 and so impeachment could well have come about. Under the RF Constitution and following a number of fundamental laws adopted in 1994 – 19955, the state system of Russia was constructed as follows: The President of the Russian Federation was to be elected every four years by universal suffrage. He was vested with considerable powers. In fact, he unilaterally appointed the Government the Russian Federation. The lower chamber of the Federal Assembly - the State Duma, had (and still has) only the power to approve or disapprove the nomination of a Prime Minister, who could, nevertheless, be removed from office without the Duma’s consent). The President had the right to veto legislation and this veto could only be annulled by at least two-thirds of the votes cast in both the lower (State Duma) and upper (Federation Council) chambers of the Federal Assembly. The President had the power to appoint and remove from office the head of the General Procuracy (with the consent of the Federation Council), and to appoint and remove from office the head of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation (with the consent of the State Duma). He also submitted to the Federation Council nominations of judges of the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court and the Supreme Arbitration Court of the Russian Federation. The President also had the right to dissolve the State Duma if his candidate for the post of Prime Minister rejected three times (so far, this right has never been used). The lower chamber of the Federal Assembly (the State Duma), comprised 450 deputies, was formed under a mixed electoral system, whereby half of the deputies were elected in single-member districts in single-round elections and the other half by proportional representation on party lists with a 5-percent threshold. An electoral 4 According to the RF Constitution, a decision to impeach the President had to be adopted by two- thirds of the votes in each of the chambers of the Federal Assembly. The Supreme Court must then confirm that there are grounds for the accusations that have been made. 5 These included “On the Election of Deputies of the State Duma of the Russian Federation”; “On the Procedure for Forming the Council of the Federation of the Russian Federation”; “On the Judicial System of the Russian Federation”, “On the General Principles of Organization of the Legislative (Representative) and Executive Bodies of State Power of Subjects of the Russian Federation”; “On the General Principles of Organization of Local Self-Government”. list could be submitted for registration by either a political party (In 2001, when the new law “On Political Parties” entered into force, there were 61 political parties) or by a political bloc comprising several public organizations. For an electoral list to be registered, it had to be supported by 200,000 valid voter signatures (or, from 1999 onwards, to pay an electoral deposit). There were no refusals of registration throughout the 1990s. In 1993, 13 electoral groupings contested the elections; in 1995 the number increased to 43 and the 1996 elections were contested by 26 electoral groupings. There was only one instance of politically-motivated refusal of registration when, in 1999, the Spas [Savior] bloc, one of whose principal figures was Alexander Barkashov, leader of the ultra-nationalist Russian National Unity6, sought to participate in the elections. The Ministry of Justice cancelled the registration of one of the participant organizations of the Spas bloc on the grounds that it was fictitious. Doubtless this was a valid reason for refusal of registration in this instance, though the authorities turned a blind eye to such infringements in case of other parties. As it happens, it is unlikely that this bloc would have posed any kind of threat, bearing in mind that the Movement in Support of the Army, headed by Vladimir Iliukhin and Albert Makashov, which was of a similar ideological orientation, was allowed to take part in the elections and obtained less than 1 % of the vote. As of January 1996, the members of the upper chamber of the Federal Assembly– the Federation Council – were elected by the Legislatures and the Executives of the subjects (regions) of the Federation (Only 1 from 2, the Governor appointed 2). Governors were directly elected by the population. The major cycle of gubernatorial elections took place in 1995 – 1996, although some Governors were elected later. Especially important was the fact that members of the Federation Council, like members of the State Duma, had immunity from criminal prosecution. This gave the Governors, especially the Governors of large and rich regions that did not depend upon subsidies from the center, considerable freedom in their decision- making. They were not afraid to oppose the center: for example, in the autumn of 6 Alexander Barkashov was the head of a group of militants which took part in the armed uprising of 3 – 4 October 1993. He was declared a wanted person, but soon was amnestied. In 1995 and 1999, his organization nominated a number of candidacies for elections to the State Duma in single-member districts, but failed to win a single seat because none of its candidates had managed to obtain more than 5 percent of the votes. The ideology of Russian National Unity was aggressive xenophobia aimed against the developed countries, primarily the USA, and the ethnic minorities of Russia, primarily the Jewish population. The organization repeatedly declared its intention to establish an authoritarian regime. The symbol of the RNU was a stylized swastika. In 2000, the organization disintegrated, and its leaders vanished from politics. 1998, almost twenty Governors signed a petition for Yeltsin’s resignation. Over twenty Governors were members of the CPRF, the main opposition party during the 1990s, or were elected with its help. The powers of the Governors were strengthened by provisions of a number of Federal laws that made it mandatory for the President to liaise with them over the appointment and dismissal of the heads of regional agencies of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, regional prosecutors, and the heads of regional property management committees and of regional state television and radio broadcasting companies. This very liberal legislation notwithstanding, the Russian Federation had no more than ten real political parties or electoral associations. The largest of them was the CPRF, which obtained 12.4 % of the vote in 1993 and obtained the highest share of the vote in the second elections to the State Duma of 1995, when it obtained 23.2 % .
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